4 Mindless Ways to Lose Weight

Stick to these easy lifestyle fixes and lose weight faster.

1. Ditch the candlelight. Sure, mood lighting seems romantic--until your favorite LBD no longer fits. One study from the University of Illinois found that keeping the lights dim lowered people's eating inhibitions, so they ate more than if the lights were turned up. They were also more likely to linger at the table and continue noshing. Music choices factor in too: Anything with a really slow tempo may also lead to loitering at the table--and eating beyond the point of being full, says Koert van Ittersum, an associate professor of marketing at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. Meanwhile, fast tunes could speed up eating, causing you to down more. What goes best with dinner? Good conversation.

Most Popular

2. Use green plates. They could ensure you'll go for more salad and less pasta. Researchers discovered that you're more likely to serve yourself a large portion of food that matches the color of your plate--possibly because you don't realize how much you're heaping on. That means if your china is green, you'll load up on, say, spinach and broccoli; if it's white, you may overeat comfort foods like mashed potatoes and creamy, buttery pasta.

3. Eat real food. Packaged no-cal, faux-fat, artificially sweetened grub may not help you shed pounds, say researchers from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, who found that people who used diet products were less likely to achieve their weight-loss goals. Researchers suspect that when we're eating a food we consider virtuous, we're likely to eat more of it. They call this the "health halo" effect.

4. Go to bed early. You'll be glad you did, say researchers from the Mayo Clinic who studied the effect of sleep on eating patterns. When participants got only two thirds their usual amount of sleep, they ate an average of 549 calories more each day--that's like adding a Big Mac! One possible explanation is that sleep deprivation can trigger a surge of the hormones that set your appetite in motion. So hit the hay, and consider it your dream diet.